AI slop has tarnished the one remaining pure thing I do on the internet which is watch videos of cute animals. I've spotted a good amount in my Instagram feed lately which I only happened to notice it was fake at the last second. I'm sure some of them I've watched were indeed AI. It feels betraying to get tricked like that.
The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
181–190 of 218 posts
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#182The cost to create content is not zero. People across the board are underestimating the cost to run AI.
I think you're conflating the cost to consumers to use AI and the cost to run AI. Sure, it's a house of cards, but the cost to consumers still rounds to zero.
Sure, but that can't last.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#183> Which means all of it is now suspect.
That's actually wonderful result. Humans and their messages are not to be trusted. It's a bit late that we had to make AI to show us that.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
> ended up with someone who was more expensive but also much more competent, and the work was done to a higher standard. How do you know that? Or is it just that your bias is coybows are bad and so you assume someone who dresses and acts better is better? Now step back, I'm not asking you personally, but the general person. It is possible that you have the knowledge and skills to do the job and so you know how to ins…
Perhaps I wasn't clear - I don't know enough to say if the job was good or bad just by inspecting it, I know the first job was bad because it didn't solve the problem , and then a more expensive contractor explained why, and did solve the problem. Our issue was water intrusion along a side wall that was flowing under our hardwoods, warping them and causing them to smell. The first contractor replaced the floor and ad…
> (We now have water intrusion somewhere else, sigh).
LOL
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#185I needed to get some builder quotes for my home. It did not enter my mind to go online to search for any. I just reached out to my family for any trustworthy builders they've had, and struck up conversations with some of my fancier neighbors for any recommendations. (I came to the conclusion that all builders are cowboys, and I might as well just try doing some of this myself via youtube videos) Using the internet to…
all builders are cowboys What does this mean?
They don't really do rework they'll rather keep plowing on assuming some slack in an ethereal safety margin.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#186I needed to get some builder quotes for my home. It did not enter my mind to go online to search for any. I just reached out to my family for any trustworthy builders they've had, and struck up conversations with some of my fancier neighbors for any recommendations. (I came to the conclusion that all builders are cowboys, and I might as well just try doing some of this myself via youtube videos) Using the internet to…
all builders are cowboys What does this mean?
Every house is different and so every job is custom. Whatever standards you think the builder is enacting to get the job done to an agreeable price is likely an ad-hoc solution that you yourself could have done as an amateur if you had the tools.
For every standard to be met, you compromise either on cash or time.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
build things """"people"""" want
People want dopamine hints, gamification, addictive distractions, and a culture of competitive perma-hustle. If they didn't, we wouldn't be having these problems. The problem isn't AI, it's how marketing has eaten everything. So everyone is always pitching, looking for a competitive advantage, "telling their story", and "building their brand." You can't "build trust" if your primary motivation is to sell stuff to you…
Fixed it for you: People are most easily manipulated into dopamine hints, gamification, addictive distractions, and a culture of competitive perma-hustle.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, but their choice of whom to trust is wildly inconsistent. There is no consistent test of how they judge some claim more or less trustworthy against an opposite claim. Of course, none of us are fully consistent, but some are just extremely so. Call me naive, but I think education can help.
> There is no consistent test of how they judge some claim more or less trustworthy against an opposite claim. From my experience, there absolutely is. It just isn't legible to you.
Ok, so what is a consistent epistemology that would lead someone to (probably an American) to believe the following things: planes are safe, atoms and viruses are real, the world is a globe, vaccines cause autism, Tylenol causes autism, vitamins are helpful, mobile phones do not cause cancer, weather forecasts are usually more-or-less right, man-made climate change is not real, the government can control the weather, GPS is reliable, stimulus causes inflation but tariffs do not, immigration harms my personal economic opportunities but natural population growth does not, the Roman Empire was real but descriptions of its ethnic makeup or the reasons for its collapse are not, etc. etc.? (the content of each individual belief is less important than the composite whole where the scholarship of strangers is sometimes accepted and sometimes rejected in a way that isn't explained by, say, reputation or replication)
The only thing I can come up with is that they do believe rigorous scholarship can arrive at answers, but sometimes those who do have the "real answers", lie to us for nefarious reasons. The problem with that is that this just moves the question elsewhere: how do you decide, in a non-arbitrary way, whether what you're being told is an intentional lie? (Never mind how you explain the mechanism of lying on a massive scale.) For example, an epistemology could say that if you can think of some motivation for a lie then it's probably a lie, except that this, too, is not applied consistently. Why would doctors lie to us more than mechanics or pilots?
Anohter option could be, "I believe things I'm told by people who care about me." I can understand why someone who cares about me may not want to lie to me, but what is the mechanism by which caring about someone makes you know the truth? I'm sure that everyone has had the personal experience of caring about someone else, and still advising them incorrectly, so this, too, quickly runs into contradictions.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
5% wrong is an extremely charitable take on the NYT. I once went to a school that had complementary subscriptions. The first time I sat down to read one there was an article excoriating President Bush about hurricane Katrina. The entire article was a glib expansion of an expert opinion who was just some history teacher who said that it was “worse than the battle of Antietam” for America. No expertise in climate. No e…
That sounds like something from the opinion page rather than the news. That is ok, as long as it's clearly labeled. It doesn't sound particularly high quality; perhaps they were a local giving their view from the community. Regardless, clearly labeled opinions are standard practice in journalism. They're just not on the front page. If you saw that on the front page, then I'd need more context, because that is not com…
It was on the front page, and, no, it wasn’t a labeled editorial. If you feel the need to research this to defend their honor, it would have been around fall 2005. I don’t assume their journalism has improved in the past 20 years, and I’m OK with not knowing.
Re: The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There is no consistent test of how they judge some claim more or less trustworthy against an opposite claim. From my experience, there absolutely is. It just isn't legible to you.
Ok, so what is a consistent epistemology that would lead someone to (probably an American) to believe the following things: planes are safe, atoms and viruses are real, the world is a globe, vaccines cause autism, Tylenol causes autism, vitamins are helpful, mobile phones do not cause cancer, weather forecasts are usually more-or-less right, man-made climate change is not real, the government can control the weather,…
> so what is a consistent epistemology that would lead someone to (probably an American) to believe the following things:
First, show me a person who believes all of them.
Then, try asking that person.
You are trying to ask me to justify entire worldviews. That is far beyond the scope of a single HN post, and also blatantly off topic.